Mild/Moderate Educational Needs

•Mild Mental Retardation (DH, EMR) •Learning Disabilities •Behavioral Disorders •Other Areas

Moderate/ Intensive Educational Needs

•Severe Mental Retardation •Severe Behavior Handicapping Condition (emotional disturbance) •Other Severe Disabling Conditions

Influences in Special Education

The Foundation Phase: Early Brain Research

Phrenology:

abnormal behavior and brain function could be predicted by examining the shape of the skull

Paul Broca

- loss of the ability to speak is often called Broca’s aphasia

John Hughlings Jackson (1874)

- added to this knowledge by showing that the areas of the human brain are intimately linked, so that damage to one part will reduce overall general functioning

Sir Henry Head

-aphasia, or the loss of speech

James Hinshelwood

-

word blindness:

the inability to interpret written or printed language despite normal vision.

Historical Overview

•Antiquity: prior to 1700 • Emergence of and Early Disillusionment of a Field: 1700-1890 • Facilities-Based Orientation: 1890-1960 • Services-Based: 1960-1985 • Supports-Based: 1985-present

Stanford-Binet Test

In 1911, Henry Goddard translated the Binet-Simon scales into English, and in 1916, Lewis Terman of Stanford University refined the mental scales into the instrument known as the Stanford-Binet.

With the beginning of World War I, the military services needed a way to obtain information relatively quickly about large groups of people for use in assigning personnel. Thus, the first group of intelligence scales (the alpha and beta tests) was developed. The results of this testing fed alarmist tendencies by suggesting that mild mental retardation was more widespread than anyone had previously believed. Yerkes's 1921 work on the intellectual capacities of World War I soldiers supported this assumption, further exacerbating negative feelings about retardation.

Facilities-Based Orientation: 1890 1960 As the 19 th century came to a close, disillusionment began to take on a more reactionary tone. A change from concern for caring about individuals who had special needs to one for protecting society from them was evident. Institutions originally designed to serve as training facilities from which individuals would leave to return to community settings now began to assume a new custodial role.

Services-Based Orientation: 1960 1985 •

Trends in Service Delivery

The concept of

normalization

, which originated during the 1950's in Scandinavia, was finding much support in the United States. N.E. Bank-Mikkelsen and Bengt Nirje were eminently responsible for the development and dissemination of this principle in Scandinavia, while Wolf Wolfensberger was instrumental in championing it in the United States.

The

right-to-education

issue was sparked in 1971 by a celebrated class action suit,

Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children [PARC] v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Supports-Based Orientation: 1985 Present This supports-based perspective promotes as a basic tenet the notion of maintaining individuals with mental retardation in inclusive settings, accompanied by appropriate supports when needed. Supports might include personal supports, natural supports, various services, and other technical supports.

1940’s - 1950’s Goldstein & Sheerer

(1947) - traumatically brain-injured World War I soldiers Four characteristics of brain injury in adults: 1. Catastrophic reaction 2. Rigidity 3. Distractability 4. Concrete mode of thinking

Strauss, Werner, Lehtinen, Kephart

•Presented a research study that related Goldstein’s finding on brain injury to children

William Cruickshank- “Strauss Syndrome”

1. Erratic and inappropriate behavior on mild provocation 2. Increased motor activity disproportionate to the stimulus 3. Poor organization of behavior 4. Distractibility of more than ordinary degree under ordinary conditions 5. Persistent faulty perceptions 6. Persistent hyperactivity 7. Awkwardness and consistently poor motor performance

Doman & Delacoto

- neurological organization theory

Kephart & Frostig

- motor/vision theories

Kirk, McCarthy, Johnson

- diagnostic testing

Stephens

- direct instruction

Kauffman, Hallahan, Hammill, etc.

•Minimal brain dysfunction (MBD) • 1960’s a movement from medical to educational models

Sociopolitical Forces

Blatt (1987) states: " Mental retardation is a concept that developed with history. It has changed through time in its nature and in its significance".

Sarason (1985) suggests that mental retardation cannot be understood fully unless one examines the society, culture, and history within which it occurs.

Related Sociopolitical Influences •Franklin D. Roosevelt, influenced this country's attitudes toward the welfare of all its citizens. Roosevelt's New Deal philosophy was responsible for much social change through legislation and the formulation of new programs. One such piece of legislation that affected individuals with special needs was the Social Security Act of 1935.

• 1950- National Association for Retarded Children (NARC). This organization, composed mostly of parents of children who were retarded, became an important advocate for these children. Over the years, social attitudes toward people with retardation had changed from fear and revulsion to tolerance and compassion.

Related Sociopolitical Influences •President Eisenhower in a 1954 message to Congress: We are spending three times as much in public assistance to care for nonproductive disabled people as it would cost to make them self-sufficient and taxpaying members of their communities. Rehabilitated people as a group pay back in federal income taxes many times the cost of their rehabilitation.

•By 1952, 46 of 48 states had enacted legislation for educating students who were identified as mentally retarded.

Major Phases in the Field of Learning Disabilities Foundation phase: 1800-1930

Brain Research

Transition phase: 1930-1960

Clinical study of children

Integration phase: 1960-1980

School programs

Current phase: 1980-present

Emerging Directions